7 Deadly Sins
by NuitSansEtoiles
Summary: Nothing is ever clearcut, and Draco and Hermione's developing relationship is the quintessence of the statement. Oneshot. Dark!fic.


**Title:** 7 Deadly Sins (1/1)  
**Rating:** R/M  
**Warnings:** Secondary Character Death, implied sexual situations  
**Word Count:** 10,503  
**Disclaimer:** Harry Potter is not mine.  
**Category:** Angst/dark/some drama/a pinch of romance  
**Author Notes:** Written for the Hot Summer Nights with Draco and Hermione exchange at dmhgficexchange. This was written a while ago (summer of 2006, I think), and it was beta'd by Emily.  
**Summary:** Nothing is ever clear-cut, and Draco and Hermione's developing relationship is the quintessence of the statement.

* * *

**7 Deadly Sins**

They were never about moonlit walks on the beach or intimate candlelit dinners or even whispers of love into each other's ears. Yet, when these two souls collided, it was an explosion between stars, galaxies, universes… a raging cosmic war, for their encounters were about passion, fury, and perhaps most of all, the baring of their very hearts and souls. They did not merely bare themselves to each other, they viciously tore, gnawed, gnashed at each other, until nothing was left of them except for a pitiful heap of what had once been their hard shells, now shattered and broken. They bared themselves, but there was nothing to bare. They were hollow, empty, only shadows of what they had used to be. It was in the darkness, in the utmost secrecy, that they came together, two hollow shells, and allowed themselves to break down. No one would be able to explain their peculiar behavior, not even they could. Perhaps they were insane, or perhaps they desperately needed each other, but whatever the twisted reason was, they could not cease their sinful rendezvous.

**_i. invidia (envy)_**

"I saw you with the weasel," he said, shutting the door firmly behind him before turning to the brunette witch sitting on the moth-eaten bed, her hair enormous and wild from the merciless thunderstorm outside.

"Really," she said sarcastically, rolling her eyes at the blond, scowling man. He oddly reminded her of a wet cat, furious and poised to strike at any given moment.

"Yes, _really_," he said, folding his arms over his chest. "Why were you with him?"

"Hmm," she mocked, pretending to inspect her fingernails. "Maybe he's my best friend and has been for the past ten years?"

"Too bad. You aren't allowed to see him anymore." He sat by her, wrapping his arms around her waist in a possessive embrace. "You know why?" he whispered in her ear, as he tightened his hold. "Because you're _mine_, and mine _only_."

She pushed his arms off of her with some difficulty as she stood up and made her way to the small window of their cabin.

"You don't own me," she said firmly, her eyes trained on the roaring waves outside.

"Oh, really?" His breath tickled her ear. "Who was the one who screamed '_I'm yours, I'm yours!_' last week? Need I remind you of the events?" He smirked venomously.

She looked at him with such hatred one must wonder why they were here, together, in this secluded cabin in the middle of nowhere.

"Do you think mocking my predicament is making you a bigger man, you _cowardly bastard_?" she spat, her lips set in a firm line.

"Don't you _dare_ talk to me like that, dirty Mudblood whore," he hissed in her ear.

_Smack! _Her hand collided sharply against his pale cheek, and though her own hand stung from the blow, she couldn't bring herself to care as she seethed, watching his reddening face turn back to her, his mercury eyes smoldering in silver fire. Before she knew it, she was pinned to a nearby wall, her hands now securely bound above her head by his own forceful hand. His body was pressed against hers, and he was so close she could feel his warm breath against her face.

"_How dare you_," he snarled, and, for good measure, he slammed her against the wall again, and despite the excruciating pain that pounded against her skull, she remained defiant.

"Don't call me a Mudblood whore," she hissed menacingly through clenched teeth.

"Oh and why not?" he asked, feigning lightheartedness. "What, you can't take the truth? Weren't you the one exchanging spit with the revolting weasel?"

"_Ron_ and I have every right to 'exchange spit', as you so eloquently put it. You don't own me. You are nothing to me."

_Slam!_ But she was undeterred.

"He treats me well, too," she continued, her gaze stubbornly defiant as her body endured more pain from the harsh impact. "…Which is more than I can say for you."

"Oh? Treat you how? Like this?" he asked softly through a smirk that served as a poor mask to his anger.

His lips descended on hers, capturing them into a sweet, gentle kiss reminiscent of the delicate fluttering of a butterfly's wings, and both his hands were softly caressing her back through the smooth fabric of her thin robes, and hence, releasing her from his vice-like grip. Just as she reached toward him unconsciously to deepen the kiss, he had stepped back; the kiss was over, the butterfly was gone, but a pleasant tingle continued to linger on her lips, and as much as she hated herself for it, she yearned for more.

"Is that what you want?" he finally asked, almost in pain, but perhaps it was only her imagination.

And honestly, she couldn't answer. He had been gentle for the first time, giving her a sweet, chaste kiss, pure and innocent… It was everything that she no longer was.

"You're a Death Eater," she murmured in manner of a reply. She did not know why she would blurt out such a thing at such a time, but ambivalently, maybe she did.

"Oh, so it's _this_"—he rolled up his sleeve to his elbow, exposing the black, burnt flesh on smooth pale skin that was the Mark, and she promptly turned away, refusing to look—"that's bothering you?"

He thrust his Marked forearm in her face, forcing her to look.

"Is _this_ what makes you run to Weasley?" he yelled at her. "Is our brave little Gryffindor lioness _afraid_ of the big, bad Death Eater?"

"Stop it," she said sharply, turning away from him, but he refused to relent, his face contorted in rage.

"Tell me, Mudblood. Is Weasley the one you want? Huh? Do you _love_ that pitiful, _pathetic_ piece of shit that's unworthy of even licking the Dark Lord's shoes?"

"_Stop it Malfoy!_" she shrieked, livid. "You can lick Voldemort's shoes all you want! Hell, you can even kiss his ass in the process too; just _leave Ron out of this_! You aren't even _half_ the man he is, so don't you even _dare_ be condescending!"

He opened his mouth to retort, but he was interrupted.

"Just stop it, Malfoy," she said much more calmly as she fell unto the bed. "I don't want to do this anymore. I hate this war. I hate what we're doing. But most of all, I hate _you_."

"Really?" he asked; scornfully and skeptically.

"Yes, _really_," she replied, glaring. "I hate you with every ounce of my being. And in the meanwhile, maybe you should get yourself a more elaborate vocabulary."

With a swift movement, she was by the door, her hand already upon the rusty doorknob. She was turning it when he spoke again.

"Well, if you hate me so much, why do you keep coming back for more?" he shot at her.

Her body froze, but no word escaped from her lips, and she did not turn back. _Why?_ Nevertheless, her hand turned the doorknob, and the door slammed behind her as his hard gaze bore a hole through the back of her head. She was numb to the furious pelting of the rain on her cool skin because one thought continued to plague her thoughts and it threatened her very sanity.

Why couldn't she just stay away from him?

**_ii. gula (gluttony)_**

She had told herself to resist the temptations, to withdraw herself from her insatiable addiction. She told herself never to see the filthy Death Eater again because she was Hermione Granger, brave, intelligent, and independent. She told herself that she was a strong woman, needing nothing and no one to tell her what to do and what to be. She told herself that she could resist the lure of one Draco Malfoy and that she was better, stronger than the weak sap that runs to the one person who should have never even entered her life in the first place.

But she was a traitor.

She betrayed her friends, her allies, and worst of all, herself and her own cause by associating herself with a notorious Death Eater, an enemy. She was pathetic, but she knew that she ought to be a loyal and intelligent leader, not a victim of her own sinful hedonism. Show resolve, determination, resistance, or so she told herself. She almost vanquished her obsession, her addiction.

But then, _it_ happened.

It would be foolish for her to hide, to cower behind useless euphemisms because the event had already undeniably occurred. No matter what she told herself or which words she chose to use to describe it, nothing will ever change the fact that is screaming bloody murder—no pun intended—right in front of her face. She could use words such as "passed away" or "passed on", but there was no use because it would never erase what had happened.

Ronald Weasley was dead. Stone, cold dead. As dead as a door-nail, as Charles Dickens would say.

And all of her efforts at temperance and resistance evaporated into thin air as she found herself once again staring into two stormy, silver, chilling depths with the roar of waves in the background. And hatred for _him_ was nothing compared to the hatred she felt for herself.

"So you're back," he said, his patented smirk plastered on his face, and she wanted nothing more than the tear it off and watch him, bleeding, rolling on the floor, screaming in pain and begging for mercy while she would just laugh and laugh and laugh.

"How observant of you," she bit back sarcastically.

"I knew you would never be able to resist me," he remarked, his irritating smirk still firmly in place, and she wanted to claw viciously, mercilessly at his rat face until she was drenched in his blood, his fantastically _pure_ blood.

"You killed Ron," she said, her eyes smoldering.

"Yeah?" he said, grinning. "He had it coming."

"And I thought you couldn't kill," she said nonchalantly, masking the hatred and anger that was boiling in her blood. After all, he _had_ shown the smallest shred of humanity in their Sixth Year, but now, the last vestiges of humanity in his black soul had all but dissipated, molding (or hollowing) him into the vicious monster he now was.

"This is war, _Hermione_." The way he drawled out her given name made her want to take out a knife and stab at him repeatedly until he was nothing more than minced meat, _Avada Kedavra_ be damned. "People change."

_No they don't. You will always be the rat-faced son of a bitch to me no matter what you do._

"Yes they do," she said through gritted teeth.

"Then I'm glad we're in agreement," he said haughtily and wrapped his arms around her in a tight embrace.

Like the weak-willed person she had become, she sank into his embrace. She wanted nothing more than to feel alive, to feel as if she were still a living, breathing human being, and not a shattered little girl involuntarily thrown into a whirlwind of destruction and chaos brought upon by the war. Being with him was an acknowledgement to the perpetual continuity of her every breath, every heartbeat, unrelenting in their combined attempt to prevent her from reaching her inevitable death, her salvation and her liberation. It was an acknowledgement to the fact that she was still _alive_, and if it was only with _him_ that her passions and frustrations could be unleashed, then so be it. She was ready to surrender because there was nothing else she could do.

It was no surprise, then, that he met no resistance when his lips crushed forcefully onto hers, their teeth colliding, clashing, and knocking painfully against each other in frantic fury. He bit harshly at her bottom lip, and until she tasted the metallic tang of blood, she did not realize she was bleeding nor did she realize that she had also drawn blood from his lip. This did not deter either as they continued their forceful, impassionate battle for dominance, their blood intermingling together, blurring the distinction between what is pure and what is not. His hands roamed around her body, groping here and there while her own hands did the same, refusing to stay idle. Her fingers thread through his fine blond hair and pulled his head down closer to her, deepening their kiss.

They fell unto the bed, clothes went flying in a flurry of colors, and before she knew it, she had surrendered herself to him just to feel fulfillment, the stupendous sensuality that comes with being whole and less of an empty shell, if only for a moment.

Is this, then, why she keeps coming back, being treacherous, just to satisfy that insatiable appetite to feel whole again, that addiction, that gluttony?

**_iii. ira (wrath)_**

The door of the cabin slammed open, and from sheer force, the moist wood was almost torn from its loose, metal hinges. And in came an even more formidable force, his platinum blond hair wild, his gray eyes narrowed into two slits, and his face contorted into a grotesque grimace of rage.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" he yelled as a greeting to the brunette witch on the bed, who, with a novel in hand, was the picture of apathy.

"What do you mean?" she asked casually, her eyes never leaving the pages of her book.

"Don't you even pretend you don't know what's going on," he hissed, and with strength that can only be exerted by a violently angry man, he effortlessly lifted the witch from the bed by her shoulders, despite her protests, and slammed her against the wall.

"Hurting me will do nothing to help you," she said icily, her voice dripping with venom.

"Yeah?" he hissed. "You'd be surprised."

Her eyes narrowed. "What's wrong?" she asked in a sarcastically sweet voice.

"You know precisely what, Mudblood," he said. "Why did you kill Pansy?"

"Well, she's the enemy," she answered with a slight shrug.

"She's a _civilian_, damn it!" he yelled. "You had no right!"

"Just because she's a coward—or should I say a _pansy_—it doesn't mean that's she's immune to the dangers of this war," she said. "I was just returning the favor anyway."

"You're '_returning the favor_'?" he hissed angrily. "Is this your twisted interpretation of justice?"

To be perfectly honest, she did kill Parkinson out of revenge for Ron, and she could never forgive Malfoy for what he did.

"No, just closure," she said.

"So how am _I_ supposed to get closure, huh?" he asked, seething in anger.

"I don't know," she answered indifferently. "It's not my problem."

"It _is_ your problem now," he said, furious. "And you're going to pay for it."

"No, I don't think so," she said, thrusting her chin up in the air. "What are _you_ going to do? Kill more of my friends? Oh yeah, that'll make you into a really tough guy."

"If you knew what's good for you, Mudblood, you'd shut up now." His voice now was nothing more than a menacing whisper, and his face was so close to hers their noses were merely a hairbreadth from each other.

With a light shove, she freed herself from his cage and stalked to the other side of the room, her eyes still intently on him and her fingers inching toward her wand.

"No, I don't know what's good for me," she said, her lips twitching at the fact that he had become visibly angrier. "Why don't you tell me?"

With a few quick strides, he was once again in front of her, and the tip of his wand was jabbed into the skin of her throat. His entire hand was shaking as he attempted to retain the last traces of his composure, yet his every breath was laborious and harsh.

She had no fear, and she didn't even feel the need to withdraw her own wand, contented with merely staring intensely into his gray pools. He would never do it, and she felt as if she could bet everything she had on it.

"So what, you're going to kill me now?" she asked calmly, her voice barely above a whisper.

He did not answer, but his jaw unmistakably clenched at her words, showing the resolve that she knew he did not have.

"Come on then, I _dare_ you," she said softly, gazing at him with increased intensity.

His hand shook violently, but he uttered no curse, and Hermione felt a twinge of triumph. She was right, as usual.

"I knew you'd never be able to do it," she said. "You're too much of a _coward_ for it. You know, it's rather _touching_ you actually kept the pretense that you care what happens to Parkinson." Her tone was nothing short of being condescending.

Before she knew it, he had slapped her, and she could taste the sharpness of her own blood on her tongue as it began to pour into her mouth. Her eardrum resonated from the blow, and she spat out blood. Her hand reached into her back pocket and whipped out her wand.

"You _hit_ me for Parkinson?" It sounded more like a statement than a question. Her eyes were smoldering in anger and hatred but also in disbelief.

"Don't you even _dare_ talk like that about Pansy," he said. "You know nothing about her."

"Yeah? You'd be surprised," she said harshly, echoing his previous words. "Don't pretend that you care even remotely about her. Tell me, do you _love_ her?"

As much as she hated herself for it, she felt and heard her voice crack at her last question, and her arm, holding the wand, dropped to her side. In response to her question, he gave her an odd look, devoid of anger, yet she couldn't quite decipher it. He did not answer her.

"Draco?" For the first time that day, her voice was genuinely gentle.

And he gave her another one of those indecipherable looks before disappearing through the door, leaving her paralyzed, still staring at the spot he had stood, and until she heard the crack that indicated he had Disapparated, she remained immobile.

"I'm sorry," she finally whispered so quietly she could not even affirm the very occurrence of her own utterance.

**_iv. avaritia (avarice)_**

"There's going to be another attack soon," he said rather indifferently.

Summer's warm, golden sunlight poured into their cabin in abundance, bathing the dreadfully bleak place with its transcendent light. Hermione looked out of their window absentmindedly at the calm, rippling of waves. The tides were tipped with white, frosty foam, and they crashed onto the yellow, sandy shore only to recede seconds later. The dark blue water shimmered and glittered under the glow of the sun, and as she watched the perpetual movement of the tides, those creatures of habit, she could not help but think about how they were analogous to her current situation. She was the waves and Draco Malfoy was the shore.

"Where?" she asked, her gaze trained on the tremulous beating of the waves upon the golden shore and the distant palm trees swaying in a primal dance in the wind, each movement an echo of the same rhythm.

As much as she tried to deny the existence of their sin, it had become a habit; they were both traitors, exchanging secret information from their respective sides. Of course, these pieces of information here and there were far from being greatly significant, but they were sufficient to keep neither side from gaining much of a real advantage in the war. However, it seemed that today, the information was to be much more important.

"Hogwarts," he answered simply, inspecting his immaculate fingernails.

Hermione jumped. "_What_?" she exclaimed incredulously. "But—but our sources believe that there will be a battle at either Hogsmeade or Godric's Hollow!"

"Your sources are wrong," he said. "This won't be like any battle you've seen."

Her eyebrows furrowed together. "How is it different?" she asked.

"The Dark Lord himself is going to be there." His voice was grave and his gaze hard.

She could not help but stumble backwards into a seat, shock and horror creating a torrent of anxiety and emotions within her. His conclusions were coolly logical. Voldemort never fought his own battles; he preferred to send platoons of his ferocious and ruthless army into a targeted area, while he was free to sit back and enjoy the show. Yes, it _had_ to be big. This one battle could mark the turning point of this war, and everything remaining would be a breeze for whichever side that wins. She had to tell Harry. And she realized with dark satisfaction that the element of surprise had just been stripped from Voldemort's plans, thanks to Malfoy.

"When is it going to occur?" she asked, trying to keep the shaking away from her voice.

He shrugged. "I don't know."

She was convinced that he knew, but she let the subject drop because they had always been vague, and there was no evidence that today would be any different.

"How about you?" he asked, and his eyes seemed to bore through her very soul.

Quite honestly, she had dreaded this question because she was unprepared to answer it. He had just divulged a great military secret, and she could think of nothing she knew to match it… or at least, nothing that she was willing to reveal.

"Oh, nothing much has been happening on our side," she lied through her teeth, but she knew with a cold terror that there was no way in hell he going to let her get away with such a pathetic lie.

His gaze was piercing, and she could do nothing but shrink away. Suddenly, his hand reached out and enclosed itself around her wrist, dragging her up from her seat and pulling her so close to his body she could see every pore on his face. His other arm wrapped tightly around her waist, effectively trapping her.

"Really?" he breathed in her ear, tightening his hold until she groaned in pain.

"Stop!" she choked out, her breaths harsh.

"Let me tell you how this works," he said deceptively calmly. "I tell you something, and you tell me something of equal value… or you should suffer the consequences." His embrace was now so tight; she could barely breathe, only eliciting a small shriek.

She couldn't breathe, and she could barely think straight. "Blaise Zabini's a double agent!" she blurted out abruptly between strangled breaths, and she instantly regretted it.

He had relinquished his death grip on her, but she still felt short of breath, and this time, it was for another reason entirely. _No_… he wasn't supposed to know that! She needed to tell him something important in exchange for his information, but not _that_. Oh, no… oh, _shit…_

Despite the fact that Zabini was a friend of his, his lips curled into a venomous smirk, his eyes full of malice. Opportunity had just presented before him with wide open arms, and Draco Malfoy was not one to allow such a perfect occasion for self-advancement pass him by.

"Thank you," he said. "I can certainly use this piece of information."

She despised him… she hated him with every fiber of her being. Her hands clenched into fists, and her entire body shook. "_NO_!" she cried out desperately. "_No_! You can't use this information! Please, Malfoy! Don't use it! Oh, dear God!"

It was true that she was not and had never been particularly fond of Zabini, but even she could not deny that he had been an invaluable asset to the Order.

"Oh, I think I should use this information," he said, his smirk omnipresent.

"Please, Draco," she pleaded, grasping the sleeve of his robes. "Please… if any of this"—she gestured wildly about her, but placing additional emphasis on Malfoy and herself—"if _any_ of what we have been doing these past couple of years has mattered to you, you would not betray me or Zabini's secret. Please, if you have felt anything for me at all, you would not use this information!"

Quite frankly, she could not say what had prompted such an intense supplication on her part especially since she had always refused to beg for anything, but perhaps it was sheer desperation infiltrating every crevice of her brain, flooding her senses. She had just buried herself in deep, deep trouble, and her ultimate fate and that of the Order, it seemed, depended solely on Malfoy's mercy, which was nearly nonexistent at this point in the war.

However, perhaps it was only her imagination, wanting desperately to believe, she saw the faintest glimmer of something in his eyes. He had faltered for just a fraction of a second, but it had been enough. Before she could ascertain her observation, his smirk was back as if it had never left.

"Zabini ought to thank you," he said casually, complete with a careless shrug.

The meaning of his words were ambiguous at best, and no matter how hard she tried, Hermione could not shake off the profound feeling of dread that invaded and enveloped her heart, trapping it in its miserable constraints. She could think of no clever or even appropriate reply, but merely stared at Malfoy, watching his face for any sign that may help her interpretation. It felt like reading a blank wall. His barriers had not shaken in the slightest at her penetrating gaze, and she suppressed a groan of frustration.

"You know," she said, "there will always be a place for you in the Order… If you—if you want to… you know…if you ever feel you need to…"

He scoffed derisively. "I don't need your repulsively happy little group of goody-two-shoes."

A new surge of anger began to surface, but she said nothing in response, biting her lip. Then, suddenly and spontaneously, his lips found hers in a passionate kiss that seemed to have the sole purpose of erasing her worries, but again, perhaps it was merely her own overactive imagination, showing her things she wanted to see, or in this case, feel. But no matter how much she tried to forget, the dread refused to be shaken off.

What will happen to Zabini and his entire network?

And worst of all, it was all her fault.

**_v. luxuria (lust)_**

Everyday after their last meeting, she was wracked with a terrible guilt that seemed to claw viciously and painfully at her heart, unrelenting and merciless in its frenzy. She watched Zabini's movements as much as possible, and whenever he returned late from any mission, worry would take a fierce, deathly grip on her heart. If she had not been so anxious, she would have found her situation amusing; her worry made her seem almost as if she were his wife. She had no doubt about his loyalty, but his haughty manner, especially toward her, was insufferably annoying. In a way, she had to admit, Zabini's countenance was irritatingly similar to Malfoy's, and yet, she was… _involved_ with Malfoy and had also found a way to tolerate his every fault.

A wistful sigh escaped her lips. _Malfoy..._

She could not help but wonder why he had not told Voldemort about Zabini's treacherous duality yet, but she did not dare to hope. It would take more than a miracle for Malfoy to defer to her pleas. Perhaps he was only biding his time, and thus, making him all the more deadly.

Nevertheless, she stood on the beach, her bare feet bathing in the refreshingly cool water while the warm and humid air of the tropics began to cool as the evening deepened into the night, and stars began to emerge in the inky black sky. A breeze fluttered by, sending her wild curls and robes flying behind her languidly, and she closed her eyes, breathing in the salty scent of the ocean and something pleasant and even more exotic from a more faraway land brought by the gust of wind.

The temporary solitude and serenity was a welcome escape from the chaotic war-torn world she was now unfortunately familiar with. However, it would be foolish of her to attempt to deny that solitude and serenity were not always what she found on this lonely island, and yet, it was as close as she could get, and it was impossible to stay away.

His footsteps had been silent, but even with her eyes closed she knew immediately that he was by her side without even having to feel his touch. He smelled spicy, his scent completely unique and not disagreeable at all to her. Perhaps she had come to find comfort in his smell, and perhaps it was a reassurance that at least something was still stable in her chaotic world. She inhaled deeply, filling her lungs with fresh air, and turned toward him. She looked at his dark outline, a mere silhouette in the sinking darkness, and she began to wonder… what was it that attracted her to him so much? He was despicable, murderous, heartless, and a poor excuse for a human being, yet she found him irresistible. After all, he was not an extremely handsome man. His features were too sharp and too angular, his eyes too icy, and his body too skinny. He was by no means ugly or unpleasant to look at, but she knew that his looks were not what really attracted her, and his personality required no words. She could not explain it, but there was just _something_.

The raw and monstrous emotion that she was feeling, though, could not possibly be love. Love was about tenderness, but that was not one of the things they shared. Maybe passion, but it was never tenderness. Lust, she concluded, must be the closest description to what she was feeling toward him.

She withdrew her wand, and with a murmured spell, blue flames erupted onto the sand, creating a vision of a blue campfire. The night was getting increasingly darker, but the blue flames, licking the air and reaching towards the heavens, cast an eerie glow on the young couple's faces.

Her gaze was turned upon his face as her eyes traced every contour created by his delicate facial bone structure, committing them to memory although she could already see every one of his features clearly and in detail once her eyes were closed. For a while, neither of them moved. She was the first one to kiss him, lightly, on his lips, and he took her into his arms, deepening their kiss. His lips trailed across her jawbone and down her exposed neck in searing kisses.

"Happy anniversary," he said, emotionless.

She smiled against his lips in spite of herself and returned the greeting, happy that he remembered. He laid her on the sand and began to unfasten her robes, and her hands fumbled to do the same. The longing, the desire was overwhelming, and her head swam. She splayed her hand on his pale chest, and her fingertips seemed to burn as they touched his smooth skin underneath, but her hand trailed down all the while aware of his touch on her torso under her the curve of her breast. She felt as if she was caught on fire, and his touch seemed to scorch her skin beneath. Wrapping an arm around his neck, she brought him closer to her, and their lips met in a passionate, desperate kiss.

What they were doing were purely the result of lust, she assured herself, nothing more and nothing less.

The bright stars overhead twinkled through the celestial darkness, an army behind the full moon, protecting its sacred light as it fell upon the couple underneath its soft caress. Minutes passed, and time itself seemed to have stopped, allowing the two in their dangerous union to cherish as best they could the few stolen moments they could share. The blue flames burned lower, and the darkness fell deeper, and the moonlight shone brighter.

Sated, she lied on her back, perspiration beading on her scalding skin. The fire by her one side and the warm body by her other side shielded her from the chill that began to set in.

Something stirred by her side, and she saw him redressing in his robes. He never stayed the night with her, in this lonesome, forsaken place, though she occasionally did, lingering long after he had gone with the sole comfort of his former presence. There was nothing romantic about it. There was _nothing_ romantic about what they were doing at all. But he was her drug, and no matter how much she hated it, she was in too deep in her addiction, and her craving was a gruesome beast within her chest that refused to let her resist him. It was lust, passionate and frantic, nothing more. No tenderness was ever involved, she told herself. It would be too out of character, and it would shake the very foundations upon which her fragile, yet stable relationship with him was built. She liked it the way it was, simple and best of all, _stable_.

"Granger," he said, suddenly breaking the heavy silence of the night.

She was dressing herself and looked up, her gaze curious. Their parting was usually silent, and this break from routine was enough to raise her suspicions.

"Yes, Malfoy?" she said when she noticed him having trouble beginning his sentence.

He hesitated, and finally said with detached politeness, "Have a good evening."

His iciness was back after being thawed for merely a few seconds, and she could not help but feel the onset of disappointment. His coldness made him appear inhuman, and just when he had shown, even if it were only for a few seconds, the shadows of humanity.

"Stay," she said, grabbing his forearm, where she felt the scar of the Darkmark scorched into his skin. She wanted to withdraw her hand, but she ground her teeth and held on.

For a second, but perhaps it was only a trick caused by the flickering of fire, his gray eyes softened. Any hint of such an incidence was immediately erased, however, when his features contorted grotesquely, his inhuman traits horribly intensified.

"_Filthy Mudblood_," he spat, his tone sharp, biting, and _cruel_.

Wrenching his arm away, he sauntered into the darkness, away from her, while she fought back tears, her jaw clenched defiantly.

**_vi. acedia (sloth)_**

She paced about the tiny cabin restlessly, filled to the brim with anxiety, and though she hated to admit it, fear. The battle was drawing ever closer, and Harry was sending more and more members of the Order and their allies into Hogwarts to guard the school and prepare it for a surprise attack. They did not know whether Voldemort was aware of the Light side's knowledge of his plans, but nothing seemed to hint at such a realization. The Order was becoming more and more agitated by the day because of the uncertainty of the time and date of the attack, but through their tension and nervousness, they had never felt more ready for a large-scale confrontation.

Her heart skipped a beat, and she paused in her frantic pacing when the door opened to reveal a figure tall and familiar. They both knew that this may be their last meeting, and it was with a bittersweet sadness that she recognized this. The next time they may see each other may very well be on the battlefield, on different sides, surrounded by their respective friends and allies. This was, then, their last chance. She had come to realize that their dysfunctional relationship had to be resolved in one way or another, and it might as well be tonight.

For a moment, they both stood still, gazing at each other, undecided in their subsequent actions. Then, hesitantly, they walked toward each other for an embrace. She laid her head on his shoulder and blinked quickly, pushing back her tears. Inhaling his scent, she felt intoxicated, and she hoped that this instant would never end, but all too soon, they extracted themselves from each other and stood in awkward silence.

"Well," she said slowly, "I suppose this is it."

He shrugged and leaned against the door, silent.

Uncertain of what to say, she sat down on the bed and stared into space, avoiding his piercing gaze.

"Zabini," she said abruptly, turning to his nonchalant form. "Where is he?"

It had been two days already past the time he was supposed to return from his latest mission, but they had yet to receive news of him and his current whereabouts. She was extremely worried, and she could not stop herself from confronting Malfoy about it. Had he told?

He smirked in malicious delight. "You goody-two-shoes Gryffindors can't even keep track of your own spy?" he drawled, shaking his head with mocking disdain.

She was in no mood to entertain him and sharply said, "Tell me what they did to him. Did you tell?"

He shrugged again. "I don't know where he is," he said simply.

"Malfoy!" she snapped. "I'm dead serious! _Did you tell_?"

He did not respond, but merely stood there smirking while she heaved herself from the bed shakily.

"How could you?" she asked softly in a mixture of disbelief and pain.

So not only had he betrayed Zabini, but he had also torn her heart from her chest and stomped on it. Their entire relationship, if one could even call it a relationship, had meant nothing to him. She meant nothing to him. Tears surfaced, but she blinked them back. She had been so foolish to believe that her words were compelling enough to change the mind of a twisted, cruel Death Eater. Even worse, she was foolish enough to believe that he felt the same way she did.

"How could you?" she repeated with shining eyes.

She, herself, was becoming uncertain of whether her words were directed toward his betrayal of Zabini or toward his betrayal of her. Grabbing the collar of his robes, she stared into his emotionless gray eyes, trembling, hesitant of whether to scream at him and release her anger or to destroy her dams and allow her tears to flow. She chose the former.

"_You_ are the most despicable bastard I have ever met!" she screeched, the fire of her rage drying her tears. "You're so selfish, and you don't care about _anyone_ but yourself! All you can ever think of is how to step on other people to elevate yourself, and I despise you. Fine, you don't care about me, but you don't care about anyone else either! How do you even live with yourself? You told them about Zabini even when I _begged_ you not to. I _begged_, Malfoy! I gave you my dignity!" Her voiced cracked, and said, "Hell, I gave you everything. And this is how I get repaid? You son of a bi—"

His lips crashed onto hers, cutting her angry tirade short, but she shoved him away.

"Listen to me, Granger!" he said hastily before she could begin again. "Stop jumping to conclusions! I haven't told anyone about Zabini yet."

Staring in shock, she felt paralyzed. He never told anyone?

"I really don't know where he is," he said indignantly.

So she _had_ meant something to him, but wait…

"'_Yet_'?" she asked angrily. "So you're planning to, but you just haven't had the opportunity?"

He scowled, formulating a retort, but instead, he said, "Fine, Granger. Believe whatever you want."

"Look," she said wearily, "tonight might be the last time I see you, and I really don't want to fight—"

"Then don't," he interrupted with a half shrug.

After shooting him a glare, she sighed, and they both lapsed into silence.

Gryffindors were celebrated for their loyalty and courage, but now she possessed neither. She was a traitor to all her friends and everything she believed in for just being here, with him, the enemy, a _murderer_. She was a coward because she had stayed idle when her friends were murdered one by one. The beast within her chest that was her guilt gnawed at her insides, and she felt nauseous.

"What are we doing?" he asked suddenly, breaking her chain of thought.

She raised her eyebrows in question, waiting for him to elaborate.

"Why are we doing this?" he continued. "What are we doing here, sneaking around, endangering our lives even more than they are already?"

She had never stopped wondering about these same questions, but she still had not arrived at any answer that seemed even remotely plausible.

"I don't know," she answered honestly.

He was looking out of the window at the setting sun, whose last golden rays of light played with shadows on the darkening beach. He looked absentminded, lost in his own thoughts, and she cherished these moments of tranquility, when there was no anger between them. Her hand reached for his, and she held his hand gently and quietly, ignoring his look of surprise. Then, as if coming into some kind of resolution, his lips descended on hers, and she kissed him back, closing her eyes as her heart burst with bitterness and sorrow.

It really did not matter why they came together, she concluded. All that mattered was that they did, and somehow it helped her survive the war at least until now. Maybe he had come to the same conclusion.

And ironically, it always seems that as soon as one stops to search for something, he or she finds it. She stopped looking for the reason behind their trysts, but it came, and she wondered whether, subconsciously, she had always known the answer. It was based on a desperate need, a way to escape from her problems without having to confront them, as she should have. The answer was awfully simple, really, but it proved to be an even greater manifestation of her cowardice.

**_vii. superbia (pride)_**

Black smoke spun in the air, suffocating her, as she staggered across the bloodied field. Her hacking coughs shook her entire body, and her shattered ribs dug into her lungs, and she wheezed. She was careful not to tread on the carcasses of the fallen, and she forced herself to avoid looking at their faces. The bitter taste of blood filled her mouth, and she spat on the formerly immaculate green lawn, now tainted with vivid red and blackened flesh. The putrid stench infiltrated her nose, forcing her to fight the waves of nausea that rose within her. Her eyes watering, she could barely see five feet in front of her face, and weakly, she tried to dissipate the smoke of the burning forest and its victims. She could hear the heart-wrenching screams of agony, but there was nothing she could do. Pain filled her every nerve, and it took all of her efforts not to scream along with the wounded and the grief-stricken, though she had every reason to do so. She pressed onward, stumbling but determined, because she had miraculously survived one of the deadliest battles of the Wizarding World even when some of the bravest, more deserving people had not.

Tears rolled down her face, washing away the dirt. She surveyed her surroundings, and the devastation seemed to numb the anguish she was feeling. The scene before her eyes appeared to be cruelly appropriate in Dante's _Inferno_. It was the embodiment of Hell on Earth. Each voice, screaming out its own pain, intertwined with numerous others to create a chorus of agony. Death reeked in every crevice of the forsaken land, and as she watched the crumbling ruins of her beloved castle, her heart was torn from her chest as an onslaught of fresh tears poured forth. _Hogwarts_… Some of her best memories resided in that ancient school, and to see it, on fire and in ruins to rival the Roman Colosseum seemed to kill a piece of her. The attack had come earlier than expected, and despite their preparedness, the devastating amount of casualties had not been foreseen.

Voldemort had been vanquished, but he had not died alone.

She had stood there, incapable to help, when she saw Harry Potter, her best friend, her rock, crumble into a heap on the ground, near Voldemort's corpse. She had screamed and yelled and cried, but nothing would bring him back. She had lost both Ron and Harry, and so she wondered… Had they really won? Did this victory mean anything at all? Was the victory really worth all its sacrifices?

Dusk was fully upon them now, and the sunset was a sight to behold. The blood shed throughout the desperate battle had tainted the sky itself, coloring it into a deeper crimson than Hermione had ever seen. The smoke created a thin veil through the last luminescent rays, and the shards seemed to cut right through the veil, the sharpness of their brilliance incomparable to the tenuousness of the destruction represented by the smoke. The sun sank beneath the horizon and behind the tall peaks of the Scottish mountains, until only a thin strip of gold remained, sparkling timidly, as if hiding its head in shame at having to bear witness to the appalling crimes of humanity.

What really was good and evil? Hadn't both sides, Light and Dark, killed in this war? Where was the line that was supposed to mark the boundary between right and wrong, good and evil, Light and Dark? As far as she could tell, both sides were filled with murderers, herself included, who would die for their own beliefs and their own cause. The members of the Order of the Phoenix, were, fundamentally, little different from the Death Eaters. The two groups differed only in their core beliefs, but their actions themselves had not been very different. As some say, history is written by the winners, and she knew that because they had won, the Light was to be glorified because its principles were "right", never mind that the other side had fought just as hard to establish its own values, no matter how unpopular and "wrong" these values were.

She could no longer move forward; her knees, already trembling violently, collapsed underneath her, and she fell along, hearing someone yell her name faintly in the distance before her vision faded to black.

Hermione jumped into a sitting position on her bed, and her sheets were drenched in her perspiration and wrapped tightly around her in an almost mummified fashion. Clutching her pounding heart, she untangled herself from her bed sheets and looked at the red, digital light of her alarm clock which glowed five thirty in the morning. Once again, she had woken two hours early because of the same terrible nightmare etched into her mind. It had already been over two months since the battle, and the Wizarding World was slowly easing into a time of relative peace, though the transition was anything but easy.

She continued her work as an Auror for the Department of Magical Law Enforcement at the Ministry of Magic, and day by day, she questioned, investigated, and delved into the crimes of the remaining Death Eaters, who had, meanwhile, been sent to Azkaban. Her nerves were stretched dangerously taut, and she was afraid that she was slipping little by little into madness, and the single greatest test to her sanity was when she prosecuted her parents' murderers and torturers. She had prosecuted them as hard as she could, fighting for the toughest punishment that the law would allow, but she still felt little satisfaction when watching their demise. It was the Nuremberg trials of the Wizarding World, and she participated as much as she could and relished the taste of revenge.

The early light of dawn seeped through the small cracks of her drawn blinds, and she knew that sleep was no longer an option. She had had this nightmare every night since that fateful day, and its horror was intensified every time by the vivid scenes engraved into her mind to be replayed night after night.

Wearily and mechanically, she began her morning routine: making her bed, taking a shower… It was a wonder how ordinary her life could still be after everything that had occurred. It had taken enormous strength to suppress her intense grief at having lost so many of her loved ones, so many of whom she had betrayed by associating herself with Malfoy. She had wept for her friends, lost in the ashes on the bloodied battlefield. She had wept for those who hadn't been as lucky, those incalculable who had perished in the war. She had wept even for her enemies, who were still human beings no matter how many inhumane crimes they had committed. Most of all, though, she had wept for herself, not for self-pity, but for having survived and remained free while so many undeserving others did not make it. Now, her tears had been all shed, and she tried her best to live her life as ordinarily as she could through the guilt and loneliness.

Her morning coffee was brewing in the coffeemaker, and soon a tapping sound resonated through the small apartment. Her newspaper had arrived. She paid the owl and brought her copy of the _Daily Prophet_ to the kitchen table. With a steaming mug of coffee in hand, she skimmed the headlines.

The mug clattered unto the table, spilling scalding hot coffee all over her hand, but she barely felt it as her eyes fixed on the headline.

"_Notorious Death Eater, Draco Malfoy, Sentenced for Dementor's Kiss_".

His sentence was to take effect the next day, and there was no hope for an appeal. It would be one day until Draco Malfoy would become an empty, soulless shell. She felt as if a bucket of icy cold water had just been dumped on her, and her heart plummeted onto her stomach. She had to see him again before… before _it_ happened.

The rest of her day seemed to pass in a blur, but somehow, she managed to convince her superior to give her permission to visit Malfoy in Azkaban. The moment her work cleared, she was gone from the Ministry to stand before the ominous fortress in the middle of the sea as the sun began to set in the background. It was now the depth of autumn, and winter would soon arrive, contributing to the early setting of the sun. The waves crashed, thunderous and threatening, against the jagged peaks of the rocks beneath, easily giving the most fearless a sense of vertigo, and she did not know whether to feel relieved or afraid when the warden ushered her into the dark castle.

Saying the smell was nauseating would be an understatement. Inside the castle were dank, moist walls, their eroded stones coated by ancient dirt. The hallways were illuminated by a few torches scattered here and there, sinking the majority of the area in darkness and shadow. Murmurs and hysterical wails echoed off the walls through the metal bars of each cell. The entire edifice reeked of insanity and death. A Dementor swooped past, and she shuddered, feeling the icy cold sink into her bones. Together with the warden, they walked through winding corridors and endless staircases until she felt disoriented. Finally, they had arrived at their destination, and the warden left to give her the privacy she had requested.

His back was facing her, and she doubted he even knew she was there.

"Malfoy," she said softly.

He turned around and gazed at her with surprise. He was even thinner than he had been during the war, and his loose, tattered robes hung around his frail shoulders pitifully. His light hair hung around his face in dirty strands, any trace of its previous shine was completely gone. His cheeks had hollowed, greatly pronouncing his already sharp features, and the unhealthy pallor of his skin shone under the translucent light from his tiny window. His sunken gray eyes, however, lost none of their intensity as they peered at her through thick lashes. She only hoped that the spark in his eyes was not from insanity.

"What are you doing here?" he asked softly, his voice hoarse.

As far as she could tell, he did not appear to be insane yet.

"I—I'm just… visiting you before the… um… you know," she finished weakly.

He sighed and approached her until only the metal bars stood between them.

"No," he said coldly, "why are you _really_ here?"

She bit her lip but did not answer. He waited for her response for a few more moments before turning away once again.

"I came to apologize," she said finally.

He raised an eyebrow. It was out of scorn, she knew, but his lips showed no hint of either a smirk or a sneer.

"_You_?" He scoffed.

"Yes," she said impatiently. "Neither of us is innocent here, so I want to apologize. First, I'm sorry for not being able to reverse your verdict or lighten your sentence. I tried, but after everything you did"—he rolled his eyes, but she ignored him—"you must understand that it just was not possible. Second, I'm sorry for placing you in this situation. I never meant to cause you to lose everything, your parents, friends… and sit here alone in A—"

"Granger," he interrupted angrily, looking flustered. "You really are sensitive, aren't you? How observant of you to notice that I have no family, no friends, no money, no name, _nothing_. Yes, Granger, I'm sitting in a lonely, cold, dark little cell with nothing but the companionship of a few Dementors once in a while if I'm lucky, sucking away what's left of my soul little by little. And what do you know! Tomorrow, I'll have the last bits of it sucked away too! Go ahead and apologize, Granger. It'll make me feel all happy and optimistic and sentimental! And better yet, I may even become '_redeemed_'! Then, the entire world will bow to your whims and become all sunshine, rainbows and butterflies! That would be nice, wouldn't it be, Granger?"

The look he was now sending her would send another woman cowering, but Hermione Granger was no such woman as she stared back with equal intensity.

"Fine," she snapped. "Wallow in your self-pity. All I was trying to do was make amends, but fine. Have it your way."

"Make what amends, Granger?" he asked bitterly. "What does it matter? You should stop living in your own idealistic world, and start opening your eyes to reality! Look around you! Everyone's dead or worse. Everything's destroyed. You have no one left. What are you still fighting for? Tell me, does it give you a sense of purpose or satisfaction to send more people to their deaths or to the Kiss? Aren't you tired of it all?" His face looked pained and strained, and for a moment, she thought that perhaps insanity had in fact set in.

Tears began to emerge, and she grasped a cool metal bar tightly in one hand to prevent herself from falling. His words were like knives, and they had cut cleanly through their target. She fought back the tears.

"You're wrong," she whispered weakly. "That's not true."

"Give up, Granger," he said softly. "You can't win. Just accept it. Give up your Arcadia. I'm sure it was very lovely, but come down to Earth. Stop fighting it."

"NO!" she screamed out loud, surprising even herself. "_Just shut up Malfoy_! I'm trying to create a better place to live in because I believe that there can still be _hope_ in this godforsaken world! Whenever there's hope, there are possibilities, and these possibilities can achieve miraculous things as long as we try! No, Malfoy, I haven't given up hope, and I haven't stopped fighting. That's why I'm outside that cell while you're inside it!"

The instant these last words left her lips, she wished she could retract them. He was livid and shaking, but his words were calm.

"Leave, Granger."

"I'm sorry, I—" she said hastily.

"_Leave_."

He was no longer looking at her, and she bit her lip, hesitating.

"B—before I go," she stammered, and he raised his eyes to her, frowning darkly, but she continued on. "I want to say thank you for helping me survive through the war with my sanity mostly undamaged, though, of course, I had many moments when I doubted I still had my senses intact. Despite all the guilt and anger and everything else… I don't regret what we had."

He looked at her intently. He had never been the romantic type, and there was no reason for him to become one.

"Good for you," he said coldly, staying true to his character.

Her hand reached for his through the bars in a gesture of comfort, but to whom this gesture was directed to was no longer certain. However, at his hostile glare, she quickly withdrew her hand and sighed in resignation.

"I suppose people like us just aren't meant to experience love," she said, studying his emotionless face fruitlessly.

"Maybe," he said simply with a shrug.

"I think it would have been nice though," she said.

For a moment, he said nothing, but when he did, his voice was bitter and angry. "Love's just an illusion of happiness created by irrational hormones that make you think you're feeling some kind of ideal attraction." He scoffed derisively, it seemed, at the very idea.

"Well…" she said pensively, "if you and I had believed in love… I would have said, hypothetically, that I—that I love you. But since neither of us does…" She shrugged.

Her incomplete sentence hung heavily in the silence, but his face continued to reveal no emotion, she perceived disappointedly.

"Would you?" she asked boldly.

After a pause, he finally said, "Maybe."

She supposed that it was as romantic as he would get, so she let the subject drop but not before a grin emerged on her face. His lips were cracked and dry when she kissed them, but she didn't stop, especially when he kissed her back. She was becoming painfully aware of the metal bars that dug into her flesh as she pressed against him, but still, they took their time. It would be their last kiss, but they were well beyond desperation, which now allowed them to cherish every passing moment spent with each other. There were no fireworks in the background and no sparks flying in the air, but that was how it had always been, and she did not want it any other way.

Squeezing his hand tightly, she pulled back and prepared to leave. She could feel his piercing gaze on her back all the way until she turned a corner and disappeared.

**_viii. Inferno_  
**  
It was pouring again. The skies were covered by thick, black clouds, sending tempestuous rain onto those below during that late afternoon. The usually bustling streets of London were oddly quiet that day, as if everyone was trying to escape the wrath of the terrible storm. The Ministry of Magic was nearly deserted, and it seemed that it was only in Courtroom Ten, deep underground, that there was any sign of activity. The room was far from being full and comprised mostly of reporters. The chair was still empty, but it would very soon be filled. In the meanwhile, the few in attendance engaged themselves in quiet conversations, except for one young woman who sat alone in the shadows, lost in her own thoughts.

Suddenly, the heavy wooden doors clanked open, and the hushed conversations ceased. Everyone's attention was now turned to the two large hooded figures and the weak young man they escorted in, his hands bound behind him. The young woman sat bolt upright in her seat, her breaths quick and harsh as she watched. The hooded figures pushed the young man unceremoniously into the chair, and immediately, the chains moved and strapped him tight within their hold. He groaned softly as the heavy metal chains compressed his lungs, but otherwise, he emitted no sound.

A portly man with large, round glasses stood before him and read him his sentence as inscribed by the Wizengamot. The young woman already knew it by heart as she listened, her knuckles white from clutching the edge of her seat. The young man listened too with cool indifference, with all of his defiance and dignity until the end. The bespectacled man finished, rolled up his parchment, and nodded to the two dark figures. One of them approached the pale young man, whose lips were set into a firm line, and bent down, its grayish, slimy hands on the sides of its hood.

The young woman stood up abruptly and hurried toward the exit, her head bowed, casting a shadow over her forehead and eyes. The small crowd murmured amongst themselves briefly as she scurried past them. The young man himself even looked over, but she was unaware, already pushing the doors open and disappearing through them. What passed through his thoughts then would remain a mystery.

She ran down the dimly lit hallway, her eyes shining, but she ran on until she found herself outside the Headquarters of the Ministry of Magic and into the pouring rain. A cold washed over her, and she felt numb to the spattering of the raindrops onto her clammy skin. She shivered, eyeing the vast expanse of gray before her, and flopped down onto the edge of the fountain in front of the Ministry. She was losing track of time, but it seemed like it had only been a blink of an eye when he emerged from the building.

He was a ghostly figure, walking slowly toward her, unseeing. Watching him sent a shiver down her spine. She lifted herself unto her feet and headed for him though every instinct in her body screamed at her to back off and run away. She resisted those urges no matter how disconcerted she felt and stood before him as a surge of profound melancholy wrapped around her heart. His face was blank and his body looked limp, with none of the former energy he had possessed. Worst of all, his gray eyes looked as if they belonged on a man inside a coffin, buried six feet under, rather than a young man who still walked around, though barely alive. His once lively eyes looked dead, and while he looked at her, it was almost as if he looked right through her into the distance.

His cheek was cool to touch when she placed her hand on it, brushing her thumb over his sharp cheekbone in an affectionate gesture. As she watched him, she began to taste salt diluted by the rain.

_fin_

* * *

**Final A/N: **Please review! 

STORY REQUEST  
BRIEFLY describe what you'd like to receive: Witty banter, a small dose of jealous!Draco, numerous trysts, and a sunset.  
What rating would you prefer? PG-13 or R.  
Deal Breakers (what don't you want?): OOCness, rape/abuse/incest/etc., death, too much sap, and unrequited love.


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